Film Review – The Moon (2023)

Space will always be a fascinating subject matter in film. Whether it’s the story of how we avoided disaster with Apollo 13, explored space in the distant future in Star Trek, or brought back a stranded astronaut on Mars in The Martian, space excites us because, for 99% of the world’s population, we have no idea what is out there, and we may never get to know. In a way, space travel films are a power fantasy—a very dangerous and scary one at times, but a power fantasy at its core.

The Moon feels like a combination of two films: The Martian and Gravity. The Moon follows our lead, Hwang Sun-woo (played by Doh Kyung-soo), as disaster strikes during South Korea’s first crewed mission to the moon. He is the only one to survive the disaster and will do anything to complete the mission. Meanwhile, a rescue plan is being coordinated to bring Hwang Sun-woo back to safety. This task falls upon Kim Jae-guk (played by Sol Kyung-gu), the former managing director of the space mission.

You can feel the blend of the two films throughout. On Earth, the cast is doing their best to bring our lead home, using any device or thruster to make this happen. This story parallels the space mission that our lead star is on, which keeps becoming more and more dangerous. As you can probably tell, this is a heavily effects-driven movie, and the film looks utterly gorgeous. The spacecraft and the moon’s surface all look incredibly detailed and believable. While it is not pitch perfect, there are moments where the weightlessness of space looks fake, and you can sometimes tell the actor is on a set. However, it is not distracting enough to be a negative.

What is distracting is the film’s length. I feel it is overly long and seems to end twice. The opening and middle are incredibly thrilling and gripping, but when the third act began, I found myself checking my watch a few times. Additionally, while it might not be a huge negative, I found it odd that a South Korean film portrayed the United States as a kind of thorn in the side throughout the film.

Even with its issues, The Moon is still a blast. Seeing a small part of humanity overcome the odds will always be entertaining. It is also nice to see other countries making space films like this. This is not the type of film we normally see from South Korea, so it was refreshing to see something different.

★★★1/2

Out Now Digitally and on 4k and Blu-ray / Doh Kyung-soo, Sol Kyung-gu, Kim Hee-ae, Jo Han-chul / Dir: Kim Yong-hwa / Altitude Film Entertainment / 12